LinkedIn Company Pages update can boost B2B social marketing

LinkedIn announced a new design for its Company Pages that follows the site’s trend of streamlining its pages to improve the user experience. The new design emphasizes shared social content more prominently and shows users their connections to the brands and businesses they follow on the site.

Making LinkedIn a part of a social media marketing strategy now requires a more intense focusing on sharing content given the redesign. Below a company’s cover photo, almost all of the page is comprised of the articles and links they choose to share. SMBs using news content marketing may have an ideal distribution method for their website content with the new LinkedIn design, as users will be exposed to more shared content.

SMBs can also include links to products and services on the new Company Pages, with a spot on the right sidebar dedicated to this. However, content is still the main focus of the layout, as well as engagement from connections on the site. Likes, comments and other activity will receive more attention based solely on the amount of space dedicated to the content itself.

LinkedIn has been aggressive in updating its site for both marketers and users in 2012, with a similar redesign for consumer profiles announced earlier this summer. Beyond that, LinkedIn now allows users to follow Company Pages, and the addition of LinkedIn Answers offers SMBs a chance to build their authority on certain topics.

As such, more businesses have made LinkedIn a part of their social media marketing strategies, with a report from IDG Enterprise finding the site was most popular among B2B companies included in a survey.